Crystal Palace Ladies FC

Crystal Palace Ladies welcomed Reading from WSL2 to the Bromley Arena for this FA Cup 3rd round tie, and although they aquitted themselves well they could not stop their more illustrious opponents from scoring three unanswered goals.

It was clear from the start that Palace were happy to allow Reading to have possession in their own half and for them to get players behind the ball and play on the break. This worked well for the first 20 minutes with Palace looking quite comfortable and Reading restricted to half chances which Sam Saint dealt with. But in the 20th minute skipper Katy Morris gave the ball away on the right, her opponent went past her and crossed for the Reading forward to get to the ball before Alex Elson to give Saint no chance.

Palace tried to come back at Reading with Roschelle Shakes, up front on her own doing well on several occasions to hold up the ball and play in Mary Onianwa on the right and Alma Donohoe on the left but both their efforts came to nothing. In the 31st minute the Ladies were two down when they failed to close down the Reading midfielder who saw her 25 yarder scream into the top left corner.It was all Reading for the rest of the half but Palace with the help of new signing Freya Alldeway managed to keep them at bay.

Palace started the second half well and looked to take the game to Reading a bit more with Sarah Jones and Angela Hiokas linking up well through midfield and although their play created chances the Reading keeper did well to save from Onianwa and Shakes. Manager Dean Davenport tried to change things by bringing on subs Nicha Dyett, Abi Igbavboa and Stephanie Mann for Eldis, Donohoe and Hiokas, and although they made a difference with Palace looking more dangerous they were rocked on 72 minutes when Reading won the ball on the Palace left to cross from the bye line for the forward to head in for a 3-0 lead. That was more or less game over and although the Ladies kept on to the last whistle Reading saw the game out for a deserved 3-0 win.

Manager Davenport said that he was proud of his team's performance, especially their work rate and desire and it was just the extra quality Reading had which was the difference between the sides